Opinion What those in favour of ‘One Nation, One Election’ don’t tell you

ONOE will have a downstream effect on voter behaviour, resulting in a significant bias towards voting for the same party at both levels. A paper published by the University of Pennsylvania’s Centre for the Advanced Study of India in 2020 titled ‘Behavioural Voters in a Decentralised Democracy’ by Sabyasachi Das, Apurav Yash Bhatiya, and Vimal Balasubramanian empirically shows that voters in simultaneous elections value heuristics like party affiliation over the candidate’s individual characteristics. They also find that the increase in the probability of a candidate winning both Lok Sabha and Assembly seats is about 21 per cent.

As a result, ONOE could lead to the homogenisation of national and state issues. This neither serves the interests of the people nor aligns with our federal structure. In the same research paper, it is found that a synchronised election doubles the probability of a voter saying, “I don’t know what is the main election issue.” While our current electoral mechanism allows for the clear categorisation of issues as state or national issues in the voter’s objective function, implementing ONOE might lead to the erasure of this division.

Indian voters may prefer candidates from the same party for both levels due to perceived benefits from increased coordination between the Centre and state. The BJP’s “Double Engine ki Sarkaar” was a dominant strategy in the lead-up to the UP polls. Could the value a voter places on this “coordination benefit” be magnified when polls are simultaneous?

Local parties struggle against well-funded national counterparts in concurrent elections. For instance, the BJP received Rs 5,271.97 crore from 2016–17 to 2021–22, five times more than all other national parties combined via electoral bonds. In 2021–22, 36 regional parties’ income was just 64 per cent of the BJP’s. ONOE could amplify prolonged election campaigns due to the high stakes. Star candidates, often holding important parliamentary or ministerial roles, may prioritise electoral concerns over constitutional duties. ONOE will exacerbate our current deficit in regulating political financing and electoral campaigning.

ONOE could potentially hamstring Parliament, as it necessitates a “constructive vote of no-confidence (CNC)” instead of a standard no-confidence vote to avoid shortening the assembly’s term. CNC stipulates that a government can only be removed if an alternate group can form one. CNC works well in cases where party fragmentation within a legislature is low. Let’s assume that in 2009, a party wished to opt out of the UPA coalition, resulting in a CNC. It would have been impossible to form an alternate government among antithetical parties that had never been in an alliance before. In effect, resulting in a political deadlock. The ability of a legislature to vote out a government is the hallmark of a parliamentary democracy, and coordination seems an excessive requirement for this. More importantly, Parliament is already hamstrung by the 10th Schedule. Is removing a regular vote of no confidence further undermining the legislature as a check on the executive?

One may argue that the benefits of ONOE, like better governance and lower costs, may outweigh the risks. But both of these are weak arguments. If the aim really was to “save” money, as of January 2023, the cost overruns on central projects were Rs. 3.19 lakh crore. Election expenditures were 2.8 per cent of that. Recouping five per cent of these cost overruns can easily fund our asynchronous elections. A financially efficient state is achieved through reforms that enhance its capabilities and discretion, rather than by synchronising elections.

The “better governance” argument comes from the Model Code of Conduct (MCC) that is imposed before and during elections. This argument misses some nuance. Firstly, MCC only prohibits “new” announcements. Existing schemes and programmes have to go on. Secondly, the EC does allow for notification of schemes under certain conditions. Thirdly, a violation of the MCC results in a mere reprimand by the EC. There is no statutory backing, despite a Parliamentary Standing Committee recommendation. It’s been flouted in campaigns and is itself a weak argument. MCC remains ambiguous and asymmetric in its implementation. Perhaps better-coded definitions would lead to an MCC that achieves its purpose while minimising the impact on the governance deficit. The MCC and, as an extension, asynchronous elections cannot become scapegoats for poor governance in India.

ONOE mandates a slew of constitutional amendments fraught with risks. It can have unintended consequences for the Indian polity and its federal structure by changing the incentives of all stakeholders involved. ONOE risks causing structural damage to federalism, distortions in voter behaviour, and homogenisation of political power. One may assume that these costs are justified in lieu of the benefits. But the fact is that most benefits cannot be linked to ONOE. There is no denying that there are problems with governance and fiscal irresponsibility. This is the first time a former president has headed a committee appointed by the government. Perhaps this is an opportunity for the government to use its political capital to solve electoral problems like opaque political financing, dynastic hegemonies within parties, poor women’s representation in politics, horse trading, and fiscally irresponsible electoral promises.

The writers are former LAMP Fellows currently working as policy researchers